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Friday, November 29, 2013

In the summer of 1816, just a year after Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo, four people took part in a story competition in the Villa Diodati, by the shores of Lake Geneva, Switzerland. The outcome is best known for Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, but other the participants, Percy Shelley (Mary’s husband), Lord Byron, and John Polidori also produced writings.
First, a wee bit history…
Just three years before in 1813, Lord Byron had written a vampire poem; The Giaour (The Unbeliever). In it, vampires suck blood to live…

But first, on earth as vampire sent, Thy corpse shall from its tomb be rent: Then ghastly haunt thy native place, And suck the blood of all thy race; There from thy daughter, sister, wife, At midnight drain the stream of life; Yet loathe the banquet which perforce, Must feed thy livid living corpse: Thy victims ere they yet expire, Shall know the demon for their sire, As cursing thee, thou cursing them, Thy flowers are withered on the stem.

So, back to the story competition…
While Mary labored on Frankenstein, Byron wrote a tale of an aristocrat traveling in the Orient, whilst Percy Shelley wrote his poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty.
The last of the four, so often overlooked, John Polidori, took Byron’s ideas and wrote The Vampyre in 1919. He based a character on the rather hectic life of Lord Byron himself (Lord Ruthven), although this was never officially admitted.
the following year, Charles Nodier wrote an unauthorized sequel to Polidori’s tale using the Ruthven character; Lord Ruthwen ou les Vampires (1820), then adapted the novel into a play, but rather than the continent, for some reason Nodier based the play in Scotland.
This was immediately adapted in into English by James Planché as The Vampire; or, the Bride of the Isles , again set in Scotland, which was performed at the Lyceum Theatre in 1820.
Now, zip past a half century or so, and we find Bram Stoker as manager of the aforementioned Lyceum Theatre in London.
He learns of the Vampire play performed so many years ago… He visits Slains Castle in Aberdeenshire, where (it is often quoted) he got his ideas for the bleak countryside of Transylvania.
And Dracula is born... proving the link of Dracula to Scotland.
Incidentally, Bram Stoker traveled the world, but never ventured into Eastern Europe.

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Is A Connecticut Vampire in King Arthur's Court the best Vampire, Historical, Time-Travel, Romance novel ever written?
Maybe.
No one writes a novel strictly in just one genre; in any work there's always at least a dipping of the toe into something else.
The Connecticut Vampire series is no different, but it does go a couple of stages further.
Historical Adventure?
Definitely; I hope the book is accepted as such from the first chapter. Although A Connecticut Vampire in King Arthur's Court looks like just another Vampire/Time-travel romp, it is researched just as thoroughly as my proper historical pieces. Every piece of mainline plot, the characters, battles, weddings, court in-fighting, etc, are pure researched historical fact.
Sci-Fi?
Yes, hopefully just as definitively. The series needs the time-travel element to work. It’s essential to both the plot and the basic nuts and bolts of the story. Many writers have created their own time-travel rules, and again, I'm no different, but hopefully I've also answered the myriad of questions regarding the typical paradoxes that spring up in the genre as a matter of course.
Horror/Vampire?
Our hero, the 24 year old Richard DeVere, is a vampire, he’s been one of the new breed for a few years in modern USA. But his usual brash tactics don’t work as well in the 16th century; every time someone dies in his close proximity, he undergoes the ‘shimmer’, a world shaking pause, felt only by him. The ‘shimmer’ is seen as time re-asserting or adjusting itself, but I also try to leave enough of a grey area for the reader to come to their own conclusions. Combined with the fact that everyone is armed with pikes, arrows, and swords, he now must be very circumspect compared to his modern existence.
But there is another field which the Connecticut Vampire series fits just as well as the ones above.
Historical Romance?
Well, although this book doesn't seem as if it fits the genre, it actually does. Poor Richard actually falls in love. Well, he falls in love as far as a vampire can. The series has a romantically driven arc, so again, ‘yes’, it falls very specifically into this category.
So, in summary, there are at least four genres mixed together here, but I found while writing the stories, that this didn’t make the writing any easier.
It also means there are four different ways that a reader can pounce on my mistakes, four different areas where I could trip myself up, throwing the reader out of the story.
With this firmly in my mind from the first concept, I was very conscious of getting my historical facts right in every regard; I needed to root this so well into Tudor England that the historical part became the norm, the smooth rails for the train, so to speak. Once that was achieved, the sci-fi, romance and vampire parts could ride the train in safety.
I’d like to say that the Connecticut Vampire series is my best work to date, but then most parents are in love with their newest sibling, compared to the one that’s been kicking around under their feet for a couple of years. So I will bite my tongue and remain quiet as to my feelings for the Connecticut Vampire series, at least until after I’ve moved on to something else….
So, if these genres interest you, please come along and give the books a try.
The high-pitched whistle’s blowing from the big black engine at the front of the Connecticut Vampire train. A huge ‘whoosh’ of steam flows onto the platform, announcing its eagerness to depart the station, and the conductor is shouting “All aboard!”
I encourage you to get on board the train and enjoy the smooth ride.

Friday, November 22, 2013

The following poem is taken from the Horror short story;The Murder of Tom Bombadil, available in Amazon. Along with Price of a Portrait they make a macabre duet of Horror.
I hope you enjoy...
(Make the sound of a mad-man's laughter in your head, then let it slowly fade away...)

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

I’d like to introduce you to the world of Vampires Don’t Cry; a gritty vampire series written by Ian Hall and April L. Miller.
The Cast;
Lyman Bracks, a High School senior, and nerd. His ‘best friend’, Alan McCartney is killed in the middle of the marching band at Friday Night Football, his neck torn to pieces by a visiting cheerleader. But strange things happen that fateful night, and he’s forced to look at his whole senior year with suspicion.
Mandy Cross, the aforementioned cheerleader, obviously has a different viewpoint on Alan’s demise, and tells her story in gory detail, opening up a whole new can of worms as she does so.
What to Expect?
Vampires Don’t Cry is a gritty, in-your-face tale of vampires and their natural enemies; the Helsing Organization. It’s pages drip with gore, suspense, violence and is definitely not for youngsters. The characters are dragged through the pages by the hair, protesting and screaming, rather than romp in some daintily orchestrated adventure.
Vampires Don’t Cry is no place for the squeamish.
What Not to Expect?
Lyman and Mandy are not models. They don’t strut through school plastered in make-up.
The vampires in Vampires Don’t Cry don’t glitter, shimmer or sparkle. They are not models; this is not mushy Soap Opera. They don’t spend all their time hooking up or making out. The vampires bite, and bit hard. The Helsings hunt and kill remorselessly.
If you like your vampire stories told honestly, with blood and gore… Vampires Don’t Cry is for you.
The Writing Style?
Vampires Don’t Cry is written by a two-person team, each taking the viewpoint of a single character above.
Ian Writes a thousand words as Lyman, then passes the ball to April, who writes as Mandy; nothing much new so far. But they have rules, and the main one is this; no one can change what the other has written, and they don’t collude beforehand.
The result is a punchy, edgy story dipping into the fertile depths of two great imaginations.
The Books;
There are four books in the series so far, and book five is in the pipeline, expected in Summer 2014. There is also a large back-story anthology, containing a full in-depth research on the minor characters of the series; Vampires Don’t Cry: Blood Anthology. Each chapter is a story on its own.
Two other books are planned for release in 2014; Vampires Don’t Cry: Origins, and Vampires Don’t Cry: The Celtic Căluşari. These are darker, older tales, but contain characters from the original stories.
The books are available in Paperback on Amazon, or on eBooks everywhere in all formats; Kindle, Nook, Kobo, Apple, Sony, etc.
To get your free introductory story, and the first four chapters of Vampires Don’t Cry, click below.

Friday, November 1, 2013

We started writing the Vampire High School series in the first months of 2012, sailing through the first volume in less than two months. It was a blast.
With the four main protagonists being Arizona High School seniors, the title, Vampire High School seemed ideal for the book, and we set the publishing wheels in motion, getting it quickly onto eBook format, and paperback, before embarking on the next project.
But we'd had so much fun with our earlier collaboration... enter Vampire High School Book 2: The Helsing Diaries, forcing us to give the first book a Book 1: Gregor Academy subtitle.
Yes, we took the last page of Book 1 and burst into another volume… the problem was, we had moved away from the original small-town High School background, and had grown into the surrounding Arizona area, running all directions from Flagstaff.
But we had the Vampire High School series to consider, so we kept the main title.Book 3: The Rage Wars soon followed, and the series continued under the Vampire High School banner. The characters had grown older, both in years and experience, again taking them past the original High School tag, but we'd put our three/four main characters through the mill, and it didn't seem fair to change the series name.
But that wasn't out current problem; we’d also invented a host of minor players in our vampire tapestry. These characters needed some fleshing out, but not in a clinical, hidden, behind-the-scenes way, but in a complete reader-driven back story anthology.
So out pops our biggest volume yet, Blood Anthology, just giving background stories.
In addition, since we hadn’t enough on our plate, we had started a new book, called Vampires Don’t Cry; a deeper, darker tale. So dark, reading it out loud, it made my wife cry.

Initially we decided to write in two separate series, but of course, we had mixed characters from each series, it seemed to be getting kinda muddy which series some characters belonged to.
Then we wrote Vampire High School Book 4: Blood Red Roses, in which our major characters, Lyman and Mandy infiltrate a vampire university, leaving their high school days firmly behind them. They’d also moved on sexually, and Book 4: Blood red Roses had an adult side and the High School banner had become misleading.
We suddenly realized we’d moved on from the original name.
So, we’ve re-branded the whole series; Vampires Don’t Cry.Book 1 will now have the subtitle; Vampire High School, as a homage to the old ideals.
And the darker book, due out in 2014? We plan on it.
We’ve decided to call that series; Vampires Don’t Cry; Origins.
It all seems simple, looking back, once you’ve talked about it for year!
All the best from April and Ian, and we hope our ‘transformation’ won’t cause you too much trouble.